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In recent years, we’ve
seen more seniors incorporating balance
training into
their fitness programs. This is no surprise when you realize that
better balance can help seniors prevent falls.
Each
year, one in three people over the age of 65 will experience a fall.
Since the topic of balance training is still rather new, I would like
to address some of the common questions associated with it.
What
muscles are used in balance training?
The
short answer is all of them. There are no special muscles that are used
only for balancing. With balance exercises, the goal is just to
maintain equilibrium. The brain will activate whatever muscles it needs
to help it accomplish that task.
Typically, the muscles of the feet and lower leg will be turning off
and on quickly to pull you a little this way or a little that way. The muscles of your torso can also activate to help
keep your pelvis over your feet. Finally, the upper body muscles will
often move the arms around. Your arm weighs ten pounds or so, so moving
it forwards, backwards, and sideways will slightly shift your center of
gravity.
How
often should I do balance training?
It
is best to do balance training exercises
daily. That is a good goal to set, but you can still benefit from doing
balance exercises even if you only do them three or four times per
week. Naturally, as you do the exercises more, your chances of success
increase.
How long
does balance training usually take?
The
surprising answer is that you probably only need about ten minutes a
day. This may sound odd to people who are used to doing cardio exercise
for up to an hour and then lifting weights for a half hour.
When you are doing
cardio or muscle strengthening exercises, your results are inherently
tied into the amount of time that those muscles are working and the
intensity of the work they are doing. However, with balance exercises,
you are training the brain. You do not need to exhaust any muscle
fibers to make an impact on balance.
How
exactly does balance training improve my stability?
As
you do a balance exercise, and you wobble slightly forwards, backwards,
and side-to-side, your brain is gathering information about your body’s
position in space. When it notices that you are leaning too far one
way, it activates a group of muscles that pull you back to center.
With balance training,
we practice this process over and over again so the brain can learn to
activate the right muscles at the right time more quickly. As that
system becomes more efficient, balance improves.
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